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Shootout at the Debt Hike Corral: 'Cut Cap Balance' or Die

These next 2 weeks may be our last chance in a generation to get Washington spending under control.

The Great Debt Ceiling Debate of 2011 is nearing its exciting conclusion.

Few Washington showdowns have been this high-stakes.

House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) finds himself in the position of the western lawman who has scrambled behind a barrel to reload his six-shooter after being abandoned by his cowardly deputy (Sen. GOP Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky).

Surrounded and outnumbered, US Marshal Boehner discovers he is out of bullets.

Meanwhile, a well-armed President Obama and his gang of congressional big spenders are moving in for the kill.

What are Boehner's options?

Well, we conveniently have a very nice summary of them, in this excerpt from a freshly intercepted email by a Senate Democratic aide:

While no one can predict how this drama will end, one thing seems apparent: the President has just about checkmated the Republicans.

At this point, the GOP seems to have only four possible moves:

(1) force a default, which both Mitch McConnell and the Wall Street Journal editorial page are openly warning would be a political disaster for Republicans that would ensure Obama's reelection;

(2) accept revenues [i.e., higher taxes] in a final deal, as even [conservative TV commentator] Bill O'Reilly is now saying they should do;

(4) settle for a version of McConnell's ‘punt’ plan, which, after all this, would not mandate any spending cuts whatsoever.

Needless to say, none of these are winning scenarios for Republicans.

Correct. But wait. All hope is not lost. The writer overlooks a 5th option.

The House could pass the Cut Cap Balance Act next week and turn the tables on Rancher Obama and his chief tax-and-spend henchman, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada).

The Cut Cap Balance (CCB) Act (bill number S.1340) was introduced this week by Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) and has 30 other GOP senators supporting it. It would do 3 things:

Cut spending by $142 billion next year, which would put us on a path to a balanced budget within the next 10 years.

Impose hard spending caps that ensure we get to balance, enforced by automatic across-the-board cuts in the event Congress fails to do its job.

Pass a $2.5 trillion increase in the debt ceiling, contingent upon congressional passage of a Balanced Budget Amendment to the Constitution.

In short: No BBA, no debt hike!

(And not just any BBA, but one that caps total federal outlays at no more than 18 percent of the economy and requires a 2/3 supermajority to raise taxes or add to the debt.)

These 3 changes would create the structural change we need to finally get Washington spending under control.

This would be WELL worth securing in exchange for "one last debt hike."

House passage of this legislation sometime in the next week or so would put the big spenders in a bind. They would have to choose between the following: (a) Cut federal spending immediately by 40 percent, in the event we hit the debt ceiling without a deal, OR (b) cut spending later, under a strong BBA.

This is Marshal Boehner's one last hope.

With a little hoopin' and hollerin' from concerned citizens like you and me, he can distract the bad guys long enough to put his last bullet -- CCB -- into his gun and reappear in the street for the final showdown.

[Update: A day after we launched our call-in campaign, Sen. McConnell decided to cosponsor the CCB Act and Speaker Boehner scheduled the CCB Act for a House floor vote (to be held Tuesday, July 19th). Clearly, our efforts are working. Now we need to keep up the pressure on Congress to actually pass the CCB Act.]

President Barack Obama has tipped his hand on how he plans to pay for his budget-busting spending increases. Media reports indicate that he plans to roll out several tax hikes totalling $320 billion in his State of the Union address on Tuesday, including raising the capital gains rate and imposing a tax on big banks' liabilities.

States that helped carry President Obama to victory in 2012, are now suffering at the hands of his signature legislation. Democrats hoping to avoid the repercussions of Obamacare are going to have a difficult time explaining away its failures in their own friendly states. Republicans are referring to it as the Blue State Obamacare Blues, with Colorado, Hawaii, Washington D.C., Oregon, Maryland, and Massachusetts all suffering varying degrees of embarrassment.

Capitol Hill Update, 10 February, 2014House & Senate/Schedule: Both chambers are in session this week. Both will recess on Wednesday and leave town through the 24th of February, unless an agreement is reached on the debt ceiling.

The Senate is set to vote on the fiscally irresponsible budget negotiated by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) soon. FreedomWorks has issued a key vote notice declaring that we will deduct the scores of any member of Congress who votes for it on our congressional scorecard. As you may imagine, this news hasn’t thrilled the Washington establishment.

When Washington raised the debt ceiling this week, the Beltway media breathlessly reported that the fiscal crisis had ended. Lawyers danced in hallways, bureaucrats twerked on the Metro, congressional aides kissed strangers in the streets — the Tea Party has been defeated! It was like VJ day for wonks.

Congress made President Obama a temporary king the other day.
And the crown was placed upon his head by none other than the Senate's top Republican, Mitch McConnell.
No joke.
On October 16th, Congress passed, and the following day the president signed into law, a bill (H.R.2775) to temporarily suspend the U.S. Government's statutory debt limit and also temporarily shift Congress's borrowing power to the president.